Religious “liberty”

I was going to write something about this so-called “religious liberty” argument that the evangelicals and right wing nuts keep spouting. But Karoli over at Crooks and Liars blog said it best. The link to the entire article is here - http://crooksandliars.com/2015/07/enough-religious-liberty-crap-already.

Here is the part I liked -

“I have had just about enough of the fearmongering and hysteria over same-sex marriage. So here are some basic things that these wingnuts need to understand.

1. 1. Churches and ministers and priests enjoy First Amendment protections, and will not be forced to perform same-sex marriages.
2. 2.Judges are government employees and are required to perform their duties in accordance with government rules, policies and regulations. The government is not allowed to discriminate. If judges and county clerks don't want to do their jobs, they should resign and let someone take over who will. They do not get the benefit of deciding who they will or will not serve.
3. 3. For-profit concerns, as I mentioned above, are required to operate under the laws of the land.

Imagine if the left had reacted this insanely when Dubya was elected by the United States Supreme Court. Imagine that they had decided that Bush wasn't really the President and chosen not to pay their higher taxes, or go off to war, or acknowledge him at all?

Can you imagine the right wing wailing and gnashing of teeth? You'd hear it on Mars.

But here's this ancient relic of a wingnut [Buchanan] calling for nullification of a Supreme Court decision because he just cannot abide the idea of gay people having a happy life.

Worse yet, WorldNutDaily exists to reinforce this crap.

Pat Buchanan longs for America to be a theocracy, something it is not now, nor has it ever been. Wishing will not make it so, and if these people cannot get their heads around two people of the same gender making a lifelong commitment to one another, they should absolutely disobey.

From Iraq, or Afghanistan, or whichever theocracy they'd care to inhabit.”

Right wing nuts go crazy (is that even more possible?)

Seen on Crooks and Liars web site posted from Breitbart Unmasked in italics.

Since the Supreme Court announced their rulings last week, the right wing nuts have gone nuclear. Here are some items that caught my attention-

Winning the nativist vote: not only is Trump now running ahead of Republican candidates who boast actual governing experience, proving that the modern conservative movement has a deeply-racist streak running through it, but he also has some new fans in the white supremacist movement. Which is all very strange, because Trump won't release his birth certificate and passport. What is he hiding?

Just to show how crazy the GOP is with their circus of looneys, “The Donald” seems to be in second place. Talk about the crazies running the insane asylum!

Idiocracy defined: the woman Texas Governor Greg Abbott has appointed to head the Texas Board of Education is a rabid homeschooler. By the way, one in ten American children lives in Texas

Texas, not noted for being a bastion of well educated politicians, has a homeschooler running the Texas Board of Education. I guess this has to be expected when you have George W. Bush, Rick Perry and now Greg Abbott as Governors - all brilliant minds.

Dropping all pretense that he's not a confederate, libertarian ophthalmologist and US Senator Rand Paul met with welfare rancher and slavery apologist Cliven Bundy this week to shore up his support among the ‘patriot' militia/III-Percenter demographic

Rand Paul confuses the hell out of me. Everyone once and awhile he says something I might agree with and then he utters something so idiotic that it makes you wonder if he’s bipolar. Of course he’s from Kentucky so maybe that explains it.

Here's what's the matter with Louisiana: one-third of Republicans think President Obama is responsible for Hurricane Katrina, which happened four years before he was president

When you have Bobby Jindal as Governor, that is to be expected.

Pursuant to the previous point: Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal held an #AskJindal session on Twitter. It did not go well; in fact, it turned out to be a truly awful idea that has taken on a life of its own. Now that he's been un-asked to address the Sioux City, Iowa Mardi Gras festival, we can truly say that Jindal's career has ebbed.

It’s so much fun watching these candidates make such public fools of themselves. Teenage boys could run better campaigns than these yoyo’s.

Someone tell Mike Huckabee that we found the Christians being oppressed. Here's a professor at Northwest Nazarene University who's been fired for reconciling with evolution; here's a minister who was arrested for disorderly conduct because she refused to stop performing a gay wedding in Alabama; and just for good measure, here are some black female AME pastors who've received threatening letters. The Episcopal Church just voted to host gay weddings. Are these the Christians you were trying to defend, Mr. Huckabee? …Hello? Mr. Huckabee?

This one is my favorite. Even if I was a Christian, there is no way in hell I would want him as my pastor. He said that the Supreme Court is not the Supreme Being. News to Mike Huckabee there is no Supreme Being!

Dire predictions from the Right Wing Nuts

Ever since the Supreme Court ruling on gay marriage, the right wing nuts and evangelicals are doing what we all expected. They are screaming at the top of their lungs that the sky is falling and we are going to hell in a hand basket. In light of that, I found an article by Brian Tashman of Right Wing Watch, in which he details some of the dire warnings the right is spouting.

When I read his article I thought that, since 2004 when Massachusetts allowed gay marriages in the state, we’ve seen none of these dire predictions. In fact, most people didn’t notice any change. The original article is in italics.

1) Prepare for Jail!

According to Huckabee, gay marriage will lead to “the criminalization of Christianity” and “criminal charges” against pastors who preach against it or refuse to officiate the wedding of a gay couple. Another GOP presidential candidate, Ted Cruz, also predicted that “Christian pastors who decline to perform gay marriages” or “speak out and preach biblical truths on marriage” will be punished for committing “hate speech.”

…. Rick Scarborough, a Religious Right activist and leading proponent of the “hate speech” myth, has insisted that gay marriage will make it “illegal” to “share the Gospel” and predicted that jails will soon fill up with pastors. He has even told conservatives that they should be prepared to “burn” if the court backs marriage equality.

If anyone in Massachusetts knows of a pastor that has been jailed for speaking out about “biblical truths on marriage”, let me know. Interestingly more churches here have been doing gay weddings and it seems that we have more gay pastors and ministers than before. Of course we don’t have many, if any Southern Baptist churches here so maybe we haven’t seen any of these pastors going to jail.

2) Civil Disobedience

Following the Hate Crimes Act debate, Religious Right leaders unveiled a manifesto called the Manhattan Declaration, vowing to commit civil disobedience in the face of what they said was growing anti-Christian persecution as a result of gay rights.

This speaks to the effort by some right wingers to promote the idea that pastors will be “forced” to do gay weddings. No one in Massachusetts is or has been “forcing” a minister or pastor to do any gay weddings. There are plenty of churches here that are willing to perform gay weddings. What a surprise. 

3) Revolution & Civil War

“This is the thing that revolutions literally are made of,” Mat Staver said. “This would be more devastating to our freedom, to our religious freedom, to the rights of pastors and their duty to be able to speak and to Christians around the country, then anything that the revolutionaries during the American Revolution even dreamed of facing. This would be the thing that revolutions are made of. This could split the country right in two. This could cause another civil war.”

The stakes are high, according to Justice Moore, since a Supreme Court decision backing marriage equality will “literally cause the destruction of our country.”

Maybe I missed it but we’ve had no civil war here.

4) Secession

“Will a U.S. Supreme Court decision declaring ‘same-sex marriage’ a ‘right’ warrant secession by some state willing and eager to reclaim America’s Judeo-Christian heritage and foundation?” WorldNetDaily editor Joseph Farah asked. “Is there one state in 50 that would not only defy the coming abomination, but secede in response? The rewards could be great. I would certainly consider relocating. How about you?”

It wouldn’t hurt me in the least to see all these crazy evangelicals leave. Massachusetts is still part of the U.S. of A. and I don’t see that changing in the near future. Texas, on the other hand, could secede and it wouldn’t bother me. With all the B/S Senator Cruz and his ilk spout, I wonder how much of this secession talk would actually get put in place.

5) Holocaust

Seeing that Religious Right activists regularly call gay rights activists terrorists, Al Qaeda and ISIS members, fascists, Nazis, and the ones who are to blame for the Holocaust, it comes as no surprise that several activists had warned of an impending holocaust of American Christians if gays and lesbians can get married nationwide.

One article that became popular among right-wing groups even stated that the gay rights movement will do to American Christians what the Turks did to the Armenians and what the Hutus did to the Tutsis. The author even warned that American Christians will soon be facing persecution as Christians do in Syria.

Not to be outdone, Keyes has claimed that gay marriage is part of a communist plot that paves the way for “the murder of the masses.”

Gay marriage is part of a communist plot? Everything is part of a communist plot according some right wing nuts. They need to look to Russia where gays are actively rounded up. Russia, when I checked last, is still a somewhat communist state. Russia has not done what the U.S. has done by legalizing gay marriage.

6) Child endangerment

The civil disobedience pledge signed by Huckabee, Santorum and dozens of Religious Right leaders includes a stern warning that “authorizing the legal equivalency of marriage to same-sex couples undermines the fundamental rights of children and threatens their security, stability, and future,” a theme frequently repeated by anti-gay conservatives.

I get tired of this one. It’s all about protecting the children so they claim. Wouldn’t it be better for kids growing up in a stable family environment, whether it is straight or gay, rather than dealing with broken homes, as so many heterosexual ones are. If the wing nuts would think about it, more marriages and stable environments benefit everyone. But they don’t think.

7) God’s wrath

Mike Huckabee has warned that gay marriage will unleash divine punishment on America. While he didn’t get into specifics, others on the Right have been happy to describe in detail the divine ramifications of gay marriage.

I guess God’s wrath came upon Massachusetts and New England last winter when we had so much snow. Wait a minute, that happens a lot in New England. I know, God’s wrath was the cause of Hurricane Katrina because of the gays in New Orleans. Alternately it was God’s wrath or Obama’s fault, pick one.

The hyperbole from these right wing nuts is nauseating!

S.M.I.T.E. Camp or Christian Taliban

I came across this the other day. There is this thing called S.M.I.T.E. Camp. That stands for Summer Missionary Institute of Training and Evangelism. Sounds like boot camp.

Looking at the web site associated with this S.M.I.T.E. Camp, it seems to be hardcore preparations for young people to do battle against those crazy non-believers. Reading the application makes one wonder why any kid would want to go to it. Of course if you have hardcore evangelical parents you might not have any choice.

The application is a hoot. First off is the “modesty visual.” This is for those females to make sure they don’t show too much flesh that might tempt those horny teen boys into doing the nasty. Just look at the neck lining for “very immodest.” One may ask WTF? Heaven forbid you end up looking at a girl’s cleavage! That would give a boy a boner in 2 nanoseconds.

And take a look at the side view. We don’t want those boobies sticking out too prominently do we? Makes one wonder why they don’t insist on the girls being dressed in a burka. Talk about girls presenting a very unappetizing picture to those boys. Maybe that’s the point.

But the most interesting (and scariest) was the dress codes. The boys only have about one paragraph to deal with. Shirts and pants. Standard stuff. The hair could be an issue for boys. “No afro, punk, weed eater, or cool dude hairstyles.” Now what white kid (and most of the applicants would probably be white) would wear an afro? Seriously? I’m not sure what a “weed eater” hairstyle is. Throw back to the 60’s maybe? And what boy going to this camp could ever be a “cool dude?” Come on, be serious.

Now we come to the girls (or ladies as they are referred to). There are four sections just for them. Of course nothing tight fitting, nothing sheer. No toe rings or anklets. Not sure I know what a toe ring is. Anyway, you girls can’t have them.

No pants ever, always dresses. And the skirt must cover those knees. I know how erotic knees can be!

Then we get to the dress check. I guess this is where the counselors get their kicks. Raise your arms so the counselor can see either your bra or possibly a little side boob. And the girl has to bend over. How kinky! Wonder if there is a frontal and rear check at that point. “If any cleavage, cupping, mid-rift, undergarments, or parts of the knees show, it will not be approved.” Educate me on cupping. Is that where a boob might fall out or am I missing something?

All this fun at the expense of the evangelicals leads to a larger point. There is the real effort by many evangelicals to shut everyone, especially the young, from the outside world. You see that in the effort for home schooling. There’s the creation of evangelical colleges and universities with the expressed aim to feed only their view to the young and to shelter from the big bad world of real things. I’ve heard it said over and over about how young Christians who attend secular schools loose their faith. Yep, that’s what happens when young people are exposed to critical thinking and reason. The Christian faith doesn’t hold up. That’s what atheist turned ardent Christian C.S. Lewis in his Mere Christianity. admitted. One really could be reasoned out of the faith. The answer, according to Lewis, is to repeat over and over, this is true, this is true, ad nauseam. That exposes the frailty of Christianity. it withers in the light of logic and reason.

I’m hoping that the more crazy stuff like this make the light of day, the more people see religion for what it is. Just an old belief system that’s run it’s course. One could hope!

Well that changes things!

What a week! First the uproar over the Confederate flag in the wake of the shootings in Charleston SC. Then the black robed dudes and dudettes said that Obamacare is still OK. Then the earth shattering ruling on gay marriage. Looks like God will move America from his “favorites” list to the “you’re in trouble now” list. Or so some on the right will say.

I’m amazed at all the hyperbole that has been spouting over these many years about how bad things will be if they don’t get their way on this or that issue. I remember after the Affordable Care Act was passed, the crazies on the right said it was going to wreck the economy and it’ll be a disaster. Doesn’t seem to be the case, as far I can tell. Maybe I’m missing something here.

Anyway the GOP clowns took the opportunity to showcase their stupidity with all this gay marriage stuff. For example Mike Huckabee said “I will not acquiesce to an imperial court any more than our Founders acquiesced to an imperial British monarch. We must resist and reject judicial tyranny, not retreat." So is the Supreme Court like the Imperial Storm troopers from Star Wars?

From Ted Cruz - “Today [Friday] is some of the darkest 24 hours in our nation’s history,” Cruz said without any regard to subject verb agreement. “Yesterday and today were both naked and shameless judicial activism.” Of course for the likes of Ted Cruz the judiciary is OK until they rule against them. Then it’s judicial activism.

Louie Gohmert, that intellectual powerhouse, completely freaked out, recommending that people flee the country since that's what God did. “It is a tragic and ominous day for the United States when a decision by five unelected justices of the U.S. Supreme Court blatantly violates the law in order to destroy the foundational building block for society provided by Nature and Nature’s God — that was stated as divine law by Moses and Jesus,” Louie said. He added “that it is God who has been the source of this nation’s unfathomable blessings.” Except that God forgot to provide water to the western U.S.

Bobby (party of stupid) Jindal said that "If we want to save some money lets just get rid of the court." And why not eliminate the IRS and EPA and Department of Defense and some others while we are at it? We’d save a boat load of cash. We’d be in deep doodoo but what the heck!

Of course he couldn’t help but trot out the old saw by the Christian right of an "all out assault" on Christians' religious liberty. Poor babies! You know you still have all those tax free churches and you can still go to church every Sunday and do the crazy stuff you always do. And you still own about 80 to 90 percent of Congress. Religious liberty? How about non-religious liberty? Freedom “of” religion is also freedom “from” religion. What is really happening is that the Christians are loosing their privileged positions because more and more Americans are tired of them bitching all the time.

Of course all this hyperbole was to be expected from right wingers. The good part maybe that with all the crazy talk they spew is giving more Americans reasons to put them in the delete bucket of politics.

Blasphemy

Well Pope Francis is not Pope Benedict but he is still Catholic and still adheres to his religions’ tenets. And as such he doesn’t like anyone ridiculing his flock’s beliefs.

On board his plane he said "If my good friend Dr. Gasparri says a curse word against my mother, he can expect a punch," Francis said half-jokingly, throwing a mock punch his way. "It's normal. You cannot provoke. You cannot insult the faith of others. You cannot make fun of the faith of others."

Sorry Pope Frank, as Bill Maher likes to call him, I have to disagree. If religion and faith are off limits to free speech, what else is off limits? When religion says things like gays should be herded into an area and left to die, as one pastor said not long ago, then free speech requires a response. If the religious folks don’t like it, tough.

Take the Westboro Baptist Church and their protests at military funerals or their protests about gays. As disgusting as they are, they have a right to say this B/S. And we shouldn’t try to stop them. But we also have the right to speak out against them and make our voices heard as well. Even to the point of mocking them. It’s part of free speech.

With the events in Paris last week, free speech needs to be proclaimed everywhere. If a particular group, like some Muslims, don’t like what the magazine Charlie Hebdo says or prints, they can speak out in  opposition. But they have no right to commit violent acts, like shooting people.

And speaking once again of Pope Frank, although he may present a softer, kinder side to the world, he still adheres to the Catholic doctrines like being against birth control and gay marriage. In an era of AIDS and the fact that condoms have been shown to reduce the spread of AIDS, the Catholic church still maintains that wearing a condom while you have sex is unnatural. At the same time they allow a ban on condoms, they sing the praise of the sanctity of life. Have sex, get AIDS and then die is the Catholic doctrine.

Of course the Catholic Church is not alone in this insanity about the sanctity of life while at the same time doing everything possible to ruin lives of others. Recently in Alabama a bill was introduced to provide an attorney to the fetus of a woman who is looking into having an abortion. Despite the fact that Alabama doesn’t have the money to do this, they are seeking to prevent the abortion and force the woman to carry the child to term. But after the baby is born, no care is given to the mother or baby. This is a clear example of the religious right spouting venom about abortions but not giving two cents to help anyone after the baby is born.

Getting back to blasphemy, religion needs to hear from everyone who thinks religion is doing harm to our society and no one should be prevented from speaking out. To be silent is to be powerless.

Charlie Hebdo

Nice way to start the New Year! Three Islamic terrorists decided that the French satirical newspaper, Charlie Hebdo, insulted the prophet and Muslims one too many times. They were so upset by cartoons, of all things, that they killed 12 people and wounded 11 others. Can’t they take a joke?

This is is another example of this “respect my religion” thing. You see it everywhere. Christians get upset if you mock the Pope, Jesus or anything in their mythical world. Muslims can’t seem to handle any comment or picture that they “decide” is an insult to their prophet or their religion. It doesn’t matter if someone from another country says or draws something they don’t like. They go into a hissy-fit and their reaction is generally violent. So much for Islam being a religion of peace.

William Saletan at Slate.com wrote recently - “The fantasy of these terrorists, like those who previously bombed Charlie Hebdo and attacked a Danish cartoonist, is that they’re honoring Islam. But they aren’t. They’re disgracing it. When you murder people in the name of Allah, you fulfill the most pernicious of all Muslim stereotypes. You do so not in ink, but in blood. Your crime sows fear of all Muslims. You don’t avenge the caricature. You are the caricature.”

There is something to the fact that a drawing can illicit such a barbaric response. That says the believers are on shaky ground. It’s akin the the southern Bible believer who says “the Bible said it, I believe it, and that’s that.”  They don’t want their little mind filled with reason or, God forbid, doubt.

When terrorists like the ones in France kill people, what do they accomplish? They showed how petty and small minded they are and how weak their belief in their religion is. Their only response to these “insults” is to gun down offenders. Again, what is accomplished? Do they win over anyone by doing this?

I agree with many who say that we shouldn’t give religion a pass and we shouldn’t insult or ridicule religion. Calling out religion for what it is, a barbaric and power hungry system of thought policing, needs ridicule to expose it’s insanity. In the U.S. where Christian politicians, who do not disguise their religious beliefs in the public arena, get upset if they are challenged about their religious views. Tough! If they use their religion as the basis of their public policies, we have the right and duty to speak out.

On a recent Bill Maher TV episode, Carly Fiorina was a guest on the panel. When the topic came around to terrorists and Bill Maher indicated that all religions have their terrorists, Carly tried to say that yes Muslims are terrorists but Christians are nice people who wouldn’t do things like that. See my previous post, Carly!

There are cracks in religion all over the world. The response you see is a knee jerk attempt to shore up religion’s medieval belief system however they can. In doing so they are showing how insane they are. Instead of winning converts they are driving people, especially the young, away. I hope that religions as a whole are going through their death throes. To quote John Lennon – Imagine no religion!

Only Muslims are terrorists?

All terrorists are Muslims? Check out what some Christian and right wing terrorists have done over the years.

Source - Alex Henderson, Alternet as seen on Raw Story, January 11, 2015

On Aug. 5, 2012, white supremacist Wade Michael Page used a semiautomatic weapon to murder six people during an attack on a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. Page’s connection to the white supremacist movement was well-documented: he had been a member of the neo-Nazi rock bands End Empathy and Definite Hate. Attorney General Eric Holder described the attack as “an act of terrorism, an act of hatred.” It was good to see the nation’s top cop acknowledge that terrorist acts can, in fact, involve white males murdering people of color.

Dr. George Tiller, who was shot and killed by anti-abortion terrorist Scott Roeder on May 31, 2009, was a victim of Christian Right terrorism, not al-Qaeda.

On July 27, 2008, Christian Right sympathizer Jim David Adkisson walked into the Knoxville Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee during a children’s play and began shooting people at random. Two were killed, while seven others were injured but survived. Adkisson said he was motivated by a hatred of liberals, Democrats and gays, and he considered neocon Bernard Goldberg’s book, 100 People Who Are Screwing Up America, his political manifesto.

The murder of Dr. John Britton, July 29, 1994. One Christian Right terrorist with ties to the Army of God was Paul Jennings Hill, who was executed by lethal injection on Sept. 3, 2003 for the murders of abortion doctor John Britton and his bodyguard James Barrett. Hill shot both of them in cold blood and expressed no remorse whatsoever; he insisted he was doing’s God’s work and has been exalted as a martyr by the Army of God.

The Centennial Olympic Park bombing, July 27, 1996. Eric Rudolph is best known for carrying out the Olympic Park bombing in Atlanta during the 1996 Summer Olympics—a blast that killed spectator Alice Hawthorne and wounded 111 others. Hawthorne wasn’t the only person Rudolph murdered: his bombing of an abortion clinic in Birmingham, Alabama in 1998 caused the death of Robert Sanderson (a Birmingham police officer and part-time security guard) and caused nurse Emily Lyons to lose an eye.

The murder of Barnett Slepian by James Charles Kopp, Oct. 23, 1998. Like Paul Jennings Hill, Eric Rudolph and Scott Roeder, James Charles Kopp is a radical Christian terrorist who has been exalted as a hero by the Army of God. On Oct. 23, 1998 Kopp fired a single shot into the Amherst, NY home of Barnett Slepian (a doctor who performed abortions), mortally wounding him. Slepian died an hour later. Kopp later claimed he only meant to wound Slepian, not kill him. But Judge Michael D’Amico of Erin County, NY said that the killing was clearly premeditated and sentenced Kopp to 25 years to life. Kopp is a suspect in other anti-abortion terrorist attacks, including the non-fatal shootings of three doctors in Canada, though it appears unlikely that Kopp will be extradited to Canada to face any charges.

Planned Parenthood bombing, Brookline, Massachusetts, 1994. Seldom has the term “Christian terrorist” been used in connection with John C. Salvi on AM talk radio or at Fox News, but it’s a term that easily applies to him. In 1994, the radical anti-abortionist and Army of God member attacked a Planned Parenthood clinic in Brookline, Massachusetts, shooting and killing receptionists Shannon Lowney and Lee Ann Nichols and wounding several others. Salvi was found dead in his prison cell in 1996, and his death was ruled a suicide. The Army of God has exalted Salvi as a Christian martyr and described Lowney and Nichols not as victims of domestic terrorism, but as infidels who got what they deserved.

Suicide attack on IRS building in Austin, Texas, Feb. 18, 2010. When Joseph Stack flew a plane into the Echelon office complex (where an IRS office was located), Fox News’ coverage of the incident was calm and matter-of-fact. Republican Rep. Steve King of Iowa seemed to find the attack amusing and joked that it could have been avoided if the federal government had followed his advice and abolished the IRS. Nonetheless, there were two fatalities: Stack and IRS employee Vernon Hunter. Stack left behind a rambling suicide note outlining his reasons for the attack, which included a disdain for the IRS as well as total disgust with health insurance companies and bank bailouts.

The murder of Alan Berg, June 18, 1984. One of the most absurd claims some Republicans have made about white supremacists is that they are liberals and progressives. That claim is especially ludicrous in light of the terrorist killing of liberal Denver-based talk show host Alan Berg, a critic of white supremacists who was killed with an automatic weapon on June 18, 1984. The killing was linked to members of the Order, a white supremacist group that had marked Berg for death. Order members David Lane (a former Ku Klux Klan member who had also been active in the Aryan Nations) and Bruce Pierce were both convicted in federal court on charges of racketeering, conspiracy and violating Berg’s civil rights and given what amounted to life sentences.

Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombing, April 19, 1995. Neocons and Republicans grow angry and uncomfortable whenever Timothy McVeigh is cited as an example of a non-Islamic terrorist. Pointing out that a non-Muslim white male carried out an attack as vicious and deadly as the Oklahoma City bombing doesn’t fit into their narrative that only Muslims and people of color are capable of carrying out terrorist attacks. Neocons will claim that bringing up McVeigh’s name during a discussion of terrorism is a “red herring” that distracts us from fighting radical Islamists, but that downplays the cruel, destructive nature of the attack.